#csm chapter 156

[degenerateshinji]

so silly this chapter hahahahhaha

[thetownidiot]

For chapter 156 imagine pochita kept telling denji what body parts he was loosing like:

[hanamybeloved]

what if asa/yoru and reze fused steven universe style to save denji?

[galaxynajma]

Honestly at first I thought that was Reze but it’s probably Asa

But hey let a girl dream okay

[os-eclipses-tamen-son-yuri]

You can't really blame me for headcanoning Denji's narrative as somewhat trans coded.

There's something about the body horror of Chainsawman thats so alluring to me, not in a purely gorey way. The imagery of ripping your body to shreds to become the Chainsaw. Of people ripping out your heart, others taking your blood. Some your legs and arms.

The feeling brought by the lack of agency in one's body.

Or rather, how people exploit and abuse their external perceived conceptualitation of your body onto you.

Chainsawman the demon.

Chainsawman the hero.

Chainsawman the monster.

Chainsawman the idol.

Chainsawman the heart.

Chainsawman the reaper.

What about Denji.

The brother, the caregiver, the classmate, the son, the friend.

Are these separate? Which one is fake? Is there a fake one? Are they the same or is one a shadow of the other? A front?

Is chainsawman denji? Who is Denji?

This separation of self, the compartmentalization of Denji's reality as seen by everyone else.

If Part 1 was about creating Chainsawman

Part 2 is about who is Chainsawman, the idea of him.

And not what he is for other people only, Denji too.

How it reaches a point in which it even becomes a maladaptive coping mechanism, self harm.

Denji craving the blood and violence and pain not because of hunger, but to numb out the dissonace.

How that dissonace is boosted even further by the fact that all the people that have seen Denji as he is have long left him or suffer because of their closeness.

There's a certain parasociality in all this mess.

How people latch onto their false constructed idea of the Chainsaw, of what it's supposed to be, what it's supposed to do; even if that's not reality, if it's not the truth, even if they dont fully believe it themselves.

How Denji is forced into it even if clearly it's not something that he especially enjoys. Not in a healthy way anyways.

How one becomes a symbol, whose meaning is given to them by others, not by oneself.

That objectification: the creation of an idol, myth. Fiction.

[hugosbigtoe]

This is all i could think about in newest chainsaw man

[ddenji]

okay i think this is about to be an unpopular opinion but…. these two are like 2 sides of the same coin to me. beyond the shared public safety allegiance, they both violate denji's autonomy (yoshida stripping him to his underwear, tying him up, and threating his family in chapter 132 vs fumiko assaulting him in the movie theater in chapter 136) and work against his own best interest for the sake of the government. however, while they both take action in trying to force denji to do what they want, fumiko takes a more directly active role in the space of the fanatic who can't see/ doesnt care about the human behind her idol, whereas yoshida takes the more passive role of the government drone who wont act to protect the human if it means going against orders. in previous chapters, fumiko actively runs away from denji, leaving him to fight for himself, while yoshida passively tells denji that he isnt allowed to protect himself, putting him in harms way in his own right (and there is still the underlying threat of violence there if he tries to protect himself). even in the panels from this chapter, we see fumiko being active about her disregard for denji's well being by asking for little pieces of him, where yoshida is more passive in his disregard of the plan to dismember denji with a simple "yeah" answer. i know that they also have their differences, but i just think that they share intentional similarities (that other characters, particularly in the chainsaw man church, also share!!) that overall lead to denji getting hurt.

[wurm-food]

Asaden nation it’s time to KILL

[swagst0rm]

156 THREW MY SO OFF GUARD LIKE:

oopsies Denji!!! Did I mention ur legs are being stolen???

ASA AND DENJI ARE BOTH GONNA REUNITE THOUGH, AND THEY ARE BOTH CRIPPLED!!! YAYYY!!!

also, barem, I love you, but if you fucking killed Nayuta I swear to god…

[kuwupikaa]

ALRIGHT.

[therealjustpeachesback]

I think Pochita is becoming more eire and less friendly because he’s either fed up with the things Denji has to go through or he’s disappointed in Denji for pushing everyone he loves and suffering for it

[revolver115]

FINALLY, ASA'S BACK.

Also, there might still be a chance Nayuta's alive, considering we never saw real confirmation of her death. Maybe 155 was just a dream Denji had while passed out, and Nayuta's actually kind of fine. The information we learn about her thoughts are still true, but she isn't being threatened by Barem or the anti-Chainsaw Man crowd.

Also, I wonder if we'll get some confirmation on what Reze has been doing recently, since she's been weirdly missing since the fight at the end of Part 1. Same thing with Kobeni, who probably would have at least kept in touch with Denji between parts, especially since she's one of the few people he really got to know to some degree.

[mayariviolet]

LET DENJI BE HAPPY FOR ONCE PLEASE PLEASE PLEADE PELASEPLEAZPOEAPSPEPSKSPSPSKDOS

[galaxynajma]

WHAT AM I READING

THE WAY MY JAW DROPPED

DENJI NOOOOO

[goreygirl03]

Csm chapter 156

[sugar-grigri]

Hello! With the discussion of Yoshida with your recent analysis, what's your perspective on Yoshida offering Denji the choice before: of being chainsaw man or having his family and how much of that was Yoshida enforcing his own ideas of what's good for denji vs his efforts to help denji in the limited scope of his position? I feel like this could have been talked about before on the blog but with added context from csm 156 interested in how this develops too

Denji is Yoshida's reflection that he refuses to see

The answer might be easy if I aligned myself with my own position, the one I established in my analysis 156, which attempts to theorize that Yoshida is on Denji's side

But you know I know I haven't convinced everyone with my blindness around Yoshida's hidden goodness. So I'm going to answer your question, but from the opposite position: let's explain Yoshida's reactions, whether as a non-ally of Denji or as an enemy. I know this may confuse you because you'd like me to analyze chapter 133 in relation to what I analyzed about chapter 156. But even if I assumed the opposite, I would have come to the same conclusion.

I love Yoshida, and even though I seem to have left him out of my analyses, I've always reflected on every one of his interventions. And something strikes me, Yoshida often seems to be talking to himself, even deluding himself almost as if to hold on.

In chapters 120/121, Yoshida invites Asa. Now fans (like me!!!) are fantasizing about rivals, a fake love triangle and a date. But in reality, it all falls depressingly flat.

But this chapter remains interesting for two reasons: two people share their experience of solitude as the only way to avoid disappointment and be happy. However, Asa projects herself into a possible love with Yoshida.

It's like reciting something to convince yourself but secretly wishing for the opposite…

But what's interesting is that we take the position of thinking that everything Yoshida said was linear.

Let's review. Yoshida knows that Asa was leering, that she looked depressed, and since he's watching Denji, he must have known about the date, hence the warning that comes later. So why get involved? As Asa's Nayuta-altered memory made him the executioner, why make her pain worse?

Because Yoshida must have had a childish reaction. It's as if, for once, he hadn't quite accepted his role as a spectator of events. I think Yoshida must have seen himself in Asa in some way. In chapter 121, Asa is all silence and Yoshida is for once almost in monologue. It was as if everything he said would convince him a little more out loud. Whether it was his theory of happiness up to........ "stay away from Denji". That point. Part of the points that concern him as much as they concern Asa.

I think and I'm convinced that even by not interpreting Yoshida as an ally, he became more sensitive and involved with Denji's plight and didn't always know how to place an emotional wall between them. Because Denji catches him off guard, makes Yoshida's smiling mask fall off. And this is something I've never verbalized before, but it's a pillar in my interpretation:

Being with Denji pushes you to be yourself.

Because Denji refuses the social game, doesn't tend to judge as teenagers of this age usually would, and has extremely sincere reactions that are so unpredictable that they don't allow for calculated responses, responses that form the shell of other characters like Asa and Yoshida.

What Asa liked about Denji, above all, was that he was able to give her confidence and make her proud when everyone else was putting her down. You don't like fish, so what? Eat starfish. Because yes, even if it was boring, I saw you, I listened to you and you made an impact on me. Because you're not insignificant.

Denji has that effect on Yoshida. Very symbolically, during their new interaction in part 2, the protagonist doesn't remember Yoshida. Of course, it's quite funny, because it can be interpreted in all sorts of ways, like the fact that Denji is so uninterested in guys that he forgets them so easily. But it's symbolic for Yoshida's character. He's so fake and so in control that Denji doesn't perceive anything in him.

And it's when he becomes more and more desperate as a result of these reactions, and when his mask gradually breaks, that Denji finally remembers his name. Because Yoshida acts less like a public hunter and more like himself, like Yoshida.

I think in chapter 133, it's really a way of trying to wake Denji up and help him. But then again, it helps to weaken Yoshida's mask. When Yoshida repeats that Denji has only two choices, that of his family or Chainsaw Man, Denji repeats that he has two. From Yoshida's point of view, this is fundamental.

The system offers only one choice, only one possible path. But Denji opposes both. In a chapter about protest, we also talk about his position towards the system. Oppose it, protest as if in the background, claim the symbol of Chainsaw Man or oppose it, see it as a societal evil, a danger of undermining the system. For I repeat, Yoshida has decided to believe in the system when Denji distrusts it.

So Yoshida gets angry, belittling Denji as if he can't see the absurdity of this dilemma imposed on a boy who has been given a choice. Who was only told there were only two choices when there were three. Rehearsing allows Yoshida to convince himself, but we see that this controlled mask has completely disappeared, giving way to anger and a kind of panic. Because Yoshida's ideals are unravelling.

Denji is a reflection.

Reflecting the cruelty of the mafia that Katana doesn't want to admit, the dream of going to school that Reze is trying to forget, allowing the trust that Asa thought impossible and the reflection of Yoshida: a teenager, who will trace a third path to the two that will be reserved for him.

If Chainsaw Man allows you to project what you want, have or be in him, hence the pandemic of CSM wannabe. Denji, hidden behind it, is doing something far more unbearable: showing us who we are.

Aki's vengeance gives way to a desire to be surrounded by loved ones, loved ones he may not be able to protect. Thinking only of oneself shows Power, through her sacrifice for Denji, that she is capable of love even if it goes against her survival.

So chapter 156 takes on a softer version. I repeat: why did you wake Denji up just to tell him he'd lost?

That Yoshida had warned him? Once again, through a strategy of self-conviction and self-protection, what Yoshida is doing is reminding us that complete alienation from the system is better than individual affirmation (which is what Denji is punished for, having repeated that he is Chainsaw Man). This identical public hunter's costume is the symbol of this submission. Yoshida is no longer even a fake high-school student. He's just a public hunter.

But I find this chapter takes on an air of funeral and goodbye. Yoshida's costume, taking on that of someone in mourning in a symbolic way.

Because saying goodbye to Denji.

It means saying goodbye to yourself.

So I ask you, Anon, and you, the reader, does Yoshida really want to continue refusing to see his reflection ?